Marius Fett Posted February 15, 2009 Share Posted February 15, 2009 AS you can see by my last thread, I installed XP on my laptop. There were problems, so I tried to go back to Vista. I can't boot the recovery partition! I hit system recovery on startup, and it just boots into XP! ANy advice? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Q Posted February 15, 2009 Share Posted February 15, 2009 What kind of problems did you have with XP? Drivers? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marius Fett Posted February 15, 2009 Author Share Posted February 15, 2009 ^Yeah, there was no SATA driver. I sorted that with advice from Ray, and I managed to get Windows installed just fine. I had trouble with sound and networking drivers, but i'm downloading some now, so it's not quite as bad. Still, I might like to go back to Vista sometime, so the fact that the recovery doesn't work is a bit worrying. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Q Posted February 15, 2009 Share Posted February 15, 2009 Yeah, sometimes it's hard to find XP drivers for the newer laptops. As long as you can find them you should be OK. As far as the recovery partition is concerned, You might as well order a disk from either MS or the laptop's manufacturer. Since you have a COA, the reinstallation media shouldn't be expensive at all, and it's always a good idea to have the disk handy anyway. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marius Fett Posted February 15, 2009 Author Share Posted February 15, 2009 I want to go back to Vista, (with XP, even with drivers I get soem funny issues) but I can't find any restore disks on the Compaq website. The Vista recovery partition is still there, do you think there's any way I can boot from it? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Q Posted February 15, 2009 Share Posted February 15, 2009 Have you tried tapping F8 during POST to see if it gives you a boot option? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marius Fett Posted February 15, 2009 Author Share Posted February 15, 2009 I only get the option to boot into XP... Is there a way I can set it to boot from the D drive automatically? EDIT: Argh, the HP website says that if a partition is modified, the recovery partition will no longer work... So I guess this means I have to get a new Vista disk... Great... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Q Posted February 15, 2009 Share Posted February 15, 2009 Like I said, as long as you have a COA it should be cheap, and they're handy to have around, if not essential. And Compaq sucks for not shipping their systems with one. Cheap bastards. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marius Fett Posted February 15, 2009 Author Share Posted February 15, 2009 I personally would never have bought a Compaq. I got it as a Christmas present in 2007. Tbh, it's rather put me off laptops. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Q Posted February 15, 2009 Share Posted February 15, 2009 You certainly have had your share of problems with it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ray Jones Posted February 15, 2009 Share Posted February 15, 2009 HP is not shipping discs as well, but they tell you to create recovery DVDs before you do anything else, it's printed in bold letters all over your new machine. I did, and then wiped my HDD, twice, just for the fun of it. What kind of laptop is that you have there? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marius Fett Posted February 15, 2009 Author Share Posted February 15, 2009 It's a Compaq Presario C700. (I really regret not making those DVD's now...) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ray Jones Posted February 16, 2009 Share Posted February 16, 2009 Well you could like order recovery DVDs from Compaq/HP... http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/document?lc=en&cc=us&docname=bph07143 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Negative Sun Posted February 16, 2009 Share Posted February 16, 2009 I had the exact same problem as you once...What I did was use a Vista installation disc from a friend and re-install it over the whole partition, the serial number for my copy of Vista is printed at the bottom of my laptop, conveniently, I don't know about yours though... Then I decided Vista sucks and I'd rather use WinXP SP3 and did the same thing, haven't looked back since Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marius Fett Posted February 16, 2009 Author Share Posted February 16, 2009 @Ray: I couldn't find any disks on their site for my particular laptop. @Neg Sun: Yeah, mine is on the bottom too. XP is doing ok, but the sound is a bit... Odd... Not really sure how to describe it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Negative Sun Posted February 19, 2009 Share Posted February 19, 2009 You got the drivers for it ok? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marius Fett Posted February 20, 2009 Author Share Posted February 20, 2009 Yeah, I got drivers for all my hardware, everything works (though the sound is odd, as I said). I'm still looking into recovers disks (checking eBay, Amazon etc) just in case, as the recovery partition no longer works. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Astrotoy7 Posted February 21, 2009 Share Posted February 21, 2009 When XP is installed AFTER vista it reinstates its old bootloader, which of course doesnt know how to find vista. You need to get vista's bootloader back in. There are two ways to do this: 1. use a proggie called easy BCD and this method or 2. use *any* vista install disc, go through startup till it gets to the install now bit, and select repair your computer>startup errors Just be aware that if you do jump back into vista successfully, it may ask you to re-enter your, which you should have no issues with seeing you have a legit product sticker... Most of the big suppliers dont ship oem or recovery discs when you first get the unit. You can make them using utilities they give you, vista ulti has an inbuilt full backup utility, or use the awesome Acronis True Image. Ah Marius, I knew it was TOO easy in that last thread... as for your XP/sound issues. what sound device is it? if you have HD audio on board and are running WDM drivers, it may sound NotQuiteRight. Best find the latest XP drivers from the device manufacturers site(if possible) mtfbwya Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marius Fett Posted February 21, 2009 Author Share Posted February 21, 2009 Hmmz, if I use that app you suggested, what are the chances of something going horribly wrong? If I manage to get the Vista bootloader working again, will it then let me boot into the Vista recovery partition by pressing F11 on startup? Or will I have to do the boot menu thing and select the Vista option? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marius Fett Posted February 22, 2009 Author Share Posted February 22, 2009 Uh, I tried restoring the Vista bootloader as you said, and it worked. When I turn the laptop on now, it boots into system recovery, but as soon as it gets to the bit where you start the actual recovery, it chucks up an error... (Can't boot XP either...>_> Edit: Meh, I managed to fox my XP install with the recovery console on the CD... I think i'll just leave it as it is, I really only use it when i'm in bed, to browse the web and to IM... Thanks for the help anyway guys.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Astrotoy7 Posted February 23, 2009 Share Posted February 23, 2009 you went through all that for a bed pc...!! You are a strange fellow Marius... my equivalent type of pc is a tablet... runs wins7 beta like a dream mtfbwya Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marius Fett Posted February 23, 2009 Author Share Posted February 23, 2009 Indeed I am... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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